Russian passenger jet crash: Search area in Sinai expanded

The Obama administration is considering “a number of different steps” to tighten security “for commercial flights bound for the United States from certain foreign airports,” White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said. “When we develop those additional measures we work closely with [the airline] industry and our international partners to make sure they are properly and effectively implemented.”

A third plane carrying the bodies of victims who died in the Sinai plane crash back to St. Petersburg left Cairo early on Friday morning, TASS quoted the Russian Emergencies Ministry press service as saying. “The aircraft is carrying the remains of victims, personal belongings and documents discovered in the vicinity of the plane crash,” the ministry said.

The UK grounded passenger jets flying to and from Egypt’s Sharm el-Sheikh after British intelligence intercepted“communications and ‘chatter,’” indicating that a major terror attack had been plotted in the region by Islamic State extremists, the Telegraph reported, citing information it had obtained.

According to the outlet, it is this intelligence that led Prime Minister David Cameron to believe that a bomb had “more likely than not” been planted aboard flight 7K9268.

The report claims that UK intelligence uncovered the information only after the A321 jet had crashed.

Up to 20,000 British tourists have been stranded at the Egyptian resort as a result of the security shutdown.

US President Barack Obama said the US is taking the possibility that a terrorist act caused the crash of the Russian A321 passenger plane “very seriously.”

“We are taking very seriously the possibility that there was a bomb on board,” Obama told a Seattle-based KIRO radio station, adding that the US is going to “spend a lot of time just making sure our own investigators and own intelligence community find out what’s going on before we make any definitive pronouncements.”

“I don’t think we know yet,” he added.

Three UK airlines – Easyjet, Monarch and Thomson – are going to run flights to bring thousands of British tourists home from the Sharm el-Sheikh resort in Egypt. The passengers will only be allowed to take hand baggage onboard – their hold luggage will be transported separately.

Such security measures were put in place after a Russian Airbus crashed flying from Sharm el-Sheikh to St. Petersburg. While Russian officials refuse to comment on the various theories as to the cause until the investigation is completed, some western countries believe that the jet could have been destroyed by an IS terror attack.

All the available evidence so far indicates that the Russian airliner crash was caused by an Islamic State bomb attack, US Representative Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said Thursday, Reuters reports.

However, another theory – that the tail of the plane, repaired several years ago, may have broken off – is still not off the table, he added.

“But I think the more likely scenario, where all indicators seem to be pointing, is that this was an ISIS attack with an explosive device on the airplane,” he said in an interview to Fox News.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and British Prime Minister David Cameron have held a telephone conversation about the Sinai plane crash. The Russian president said it is necessary to use data gathered during the official investigation to find out the reasons for the incident. The leaders also discussed the joint fight against terrorism.

Lufthansa’s low-cost carriers Edelweiss and Eurowings are halting their flights to Sharm el-Sheikh in the wake of the announcement by British authorities that a terrorist group affiliated to ISIS in Egypt may be responsible for downing the Russian airliner, Reuters reported.

Both carriers were flying to the Egyptian holiday destination twice a week. Lufthansa now plans to cooperate with Germany’s foreign office and travel companies to bring tourists back from Sharm el-Sheikh.

France has halted all flights to Sharm el-Sheikh for security reasons, following the earlier announcement that the UK is stopping all flights to the Egyptian resort.

The body of 10-month-old girl Darina Gromova, who became the symbol of the fatal A321 plane crash in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, has been discovered by rescue teams, TASS news agency has reported.

« Now she is being taken to Cairo, from there she will be sent to St. Petersburg to be identified by the relatives, » the head of Russian Emergencies Ministry’s operation headquarters in Egypt, Vladimir Svetelsky, said.